In the world of showjumping, a CSIO 5* Grand Prix class is one of the important ones! It is a class everyone wants to have on their CV - so the pressure is on for the riders, but the other person who is under pressure for these classes is the Course Designer.

To design for a 5* Grand Prix the Course Designer must be a listed International Designer and the job doesn't go to novices at this level!

Dublin Horse Show are known for getting the big names in for the week and this year they invited home grown Alan Wade - and so the pressure was on him.

This week proved to the International riders that Alan Wade - pictured right - is up there with the very elite of Course Designers and his Longines Grand Prix track proved to be his jewel in the crown.

The 14 fence, 17 effort course included a 4.2m open water, a treble of oxer, oxer, vertical in the middle of the track and almost at the end a double of vertical, oxer to the final fence, a very tall and wide oxer.

Wades course today required horses that rode off

leg, going forward and aside from being obedient, they had to have scope in reserve as the course was technical and tall.

So the clock struck 3.10pm on an overcast, but dry day at the Dublin Horse Show and the first rider entered the ring!

First in was 24 year old Irishman Thomas Ryan who stepped up to International duty in 2008 and has been progressing so smoothly at this level - and today he showed just what a perfomer he is - first in with his 12 year old Esprit De Conquete gelding Urlevel Van De Helle - pictured below - and he jumped a perfect clear round in 88.15secs on the 89 secs course.

So the young Irishman set the standard - next out was former World Champion Irishman, Dermott Lennon but today was not to be his day when after lowering a bagful of fences he opted to retire Lanceretto.

Next into the ring was Dutchman Leon Thijssen and they too opted to retire after also gathering his bagful of penalties.

Thomas was looking legendary at this early stage!

Ireland was back in the ring with the very in form Trevor Breen aboard the 10 year old grey gelding son of Clinton, Womack. This combination had just the one fence down, number 3 - the clock tower vertical at the far end of the arena behind the bank and collected a time penalty on his journey as well - finishing with 5 faults.

Captain David O'Brien and the Minister for Defence's Mo Chroi (meaning my heart in Irish) - this mare is a favourite of ours - a 12 year old mare by Cruising but today was not to be her day when O'Brien decided to retire also after having fence 3 down followed by fence 8, an oxer preferring to not frightened this brave and careful mare.

Ireland was again into the ring, this time with Shane Sweetman and the 9 year old Darco stallion, Amaretto Darco and they were looking good until the rails and plank vertical of huts at fence 9 fell followed by the Irish phone box vertical at 11 finishing with 8 faults plus one time fault.

America's Cara Raether was also an 8 faulter with a 12 year old stallion son of Darco, Ublesco.

Eight into the ring was Egyptian Abdel Said riding for Albert Peffer Star Horses - this 20 year old has been steadily rising star who is currently ranked at 126 in the world having moved from 181.

The crowd showed their appreciation of a super round with the huge roar that went up when youngster Said came through the finish flags clear on jumping and time, with the 9 year old bay Phin Phin gelding, Avenir.

So far the youngsters were the successful ones!!!! Could the older more experienced riders match them?

The show was not going to prove to be a highlight for the cheeky talented Brit, Geoff Billington who decided to retire Rosinus after fence 4 fell - so now out of 9 riders we had 4 retired and only 2 clears - no question this was going to be a tough class to win!

Ireland's next entry, British based Dave Quigley became the 4th victim (out of 10 riders) to fence 3 and then added 3 more to finish on 16 jumping and 2 time penalties.

Baby of the American Aga Khan team, Charlie Jayne (23 year old) was next into the ring with The London Group's Athena, a 9 year old mare by Toulon and despite a super ride the mare looked a little tired towards the end of the course and finished with 12 faults.

Ireland's Niall Talbot finished round one with 16 jumping and 1 time penalties with fence 3 being one of his faults and Germany's Andreas Knippling was also victim to fence 3 and collected a time penalty to finish with 5 faults, making him the 6th of 13 riders to lower fence 3.

At this point people everywhere were wondering why this fence was causing so much issue - it was a straight forward fence, out by itself, with plenty of room to get to it and nothing particularly daunting following it - it was a vertical of plank, rails, plank - no water under it - no glaring/flaring behind it - there did not seem to be any reason for this fence to be causing so many problems!

And the problems continued - Billy Twomey for Ireland lowered fence 3 and 10 to finish with 8 faults. Following Billy was Dutch son Olympic Silver medallist, Albert Voorn, Vincent and the 25 year old didn't have a dream run when he too lowered fence 3, followed by 4 and 5 to finish with 12 faults.

Niklaus Schurtenberger for Switzerland finished with just 4 faults but it was the bogey fence 3 which got him and he also collected a time penalty for his troubles.

By now we had 9 out of 16 riders who had collected faults at fence 3 - and Course Designer Alan Wade had been out to investigate what was going on!

The issue was quite a simple one - the riders were taking the fence as a "give me" fence in that they didn't think they had to take it too seriously and were taking it on an angle when it really needed to be approached very straight,

Italian Natale Chiaudani finished with 8 faults and finally our third clear round came from Beat Mandli with the 9 year old Lord gelding Louis - pictured below - for Switzerland.

Louis is a horse with scope he will never need to test - he makes a 1.60m fence look no more than the local pony club jumps and at just 9 years of age he would have to be a horse being set for London Olympics.

Italian Piergiorgio Bucci was the next into the ring to give us a clear round - even though they rattled the Irish brooch oxer at fence 10 and even though it rolled in the cups it stayed put and Bucci was to join the second round.

Peter Charles for England had a nasty fall at the open water when the horse appeared to trip at the edge of the water and sent Peter Charles to the ground, after desperately trying to stay aboard - ther horse was fine, Peter looked a little dazed and there was blood possibly from his glasses digging in, as he fell forwards on his face.

By rider 26 we still only had four clear rounds but Tim Stockdale for Britain changed that when he and FResh Direct Corlato gave a great jumping display which saw a bit of luck at fence 13A, which they gave a good shake to but it did stay put adding this combination to the second round starters.

German's Toni Hassman was next to go with the striking 12 year old mare Lolita and they too jumped a super clear round, with just a heart stopping moment at fence 13A when the mare kicked back, giving the fence a rattle but leaving it in place.

So suddenly we had 6 clear rounds with 13 riders to go!

Sweden's Rolf-Goran Bengtsson looked like he was joining the second round players until the last fence tumbled leaving them with four faults.

Defending Champion from 2008, Jessica Kurten was not going forward to round two after she and the 9 year old mare Castle Forbes Cosma lowered fences 11 and 12 leaving the with 8 penalties.

Switzerland's Pius Schwizer gave an incredibly impressive display of text book jumping on the 8 year old Carvallo mare Carlina and they joined the second round with their clear.

Ben Maher (Great Britain), Philippe Le Jeune (Belgium), and Roger Yves Bost (France) all then followed in quick succession with clear rounds and suddenly we had 10 clears for the second round, meaning that 4 faulters would not be invited back.

The last clear round came from 3rd last rider, Frenchman Timothee Anciaume and the exceptional handsome, talented and scopey, 10 year old French bred stallion Lamm De Fetan.